by Alex â‹® Knowing how much RAM or Memory you need for editing your Photos in Photoshop can be quite tricky at times because there are so many factors to keep in mind.
This is why I have put together this overview guide that will hopefully answer all your questions about RAM/Memory usage when Editing Images.
First of all, the total Memory usage can be split up into 2 main parts:
- How much RAM does your Photo Editing Software need?
- How much RAM does the rest of your typical System need to run stable?
Let’s start with the second one so we have that out of the way.
Just in case you are looking for some quick RAM recommendations, this is one of the best performing Memory Kit you can buy. The value is great, and if you are upgrading your RAM, do take a look: 16GB Corsair Vengeance LPX DDR4 3200MHz RAM
How much RAM does a typical Computer need to run?
To make this easier, I’ll describe an average Photo Editor’s Computer. It runs Win 10, usually has a browser such as Chrome open with some tabs, an Email Software, and a Windows Photo-Viewer.
Chrome is using 1.3 GByte, the Foto Viewer about 250 MByte, My Email Software another 125 MByte and so on. Let’s take a look what Win 10 uses with only these 3 additional Programs started:
6 GByte of RAM is used, just so the System and some Standard programs can run.
Now that we know how much RAM a typical System uses just to run, I’ll show you how much additional RAM you will need for Photo Editing:
How much RAM does Photoshop need?
This is how can you find out how much RAM you are currently using for Photoshop and how much you will probably need depending on your use case.
After a fresh start of Photoshop, without having any Photos open, the Software itself needs 262MByte of RAM. Start your Task Manager and see for yourself:
Now after opening a 5MByte JPG 12MP 8bpc (bits per channel) Image, my RAM usage increases to 369 MByte.
Why does it increase over 100 MByte? My Image File Size is only about 5 MByte?
Image Compression
Well, the answer is, your Photo Editing Software decompresses any compressed Image File types to make them editable.
JPG is a compressed Image file type, as are PNG and GIF. By using algorithms, the Software can decrease file-size, without losing noticeable Quality. An Image, of course, can only be compressed so much until a quality loss is noticeable.
The reason why a Photo Editing Software decompresses an Image while you edit it is because your photo manipulations are done on a pixel basis, and having to compress the Image after every pixel-change, will make the editing very slow and CPU intensive.
Bit Depth
Another factor for calculating how much RAM you need to edit an uncompressed Image, is Bit Depth.
Typically you edit your Images in RGB mode, meaning you have three channels (R, G, and B) and every channel will be able to save 8 bits or 256 different values. 8 bits per channel, 256 Values per Channel (or Color). All your JPG Images are in 8bpc or 24bpp (bits per pixel).
Resolution
The next important factor, of course, is the Image Resolution. The Math, fortunately, is quite easy:
[Pixel Amount in Width] x [Pixel Amount in Height] x [Bit Depth] x [Number of Channels] divided by 8000000
Why 8 Million? Because 8 Bits are one Byte and a Megabyte are 1000000 Byte.
This will give you the Uncompressed Image Size in MByte that resides in your RAM. If you only have one Layer!
Layers in Photoshop
If you have more than one Layer, you can roughly multiply the amount of RAM usage per Image by the number of Layers.
Also, in Photoshop you can easily find how much RAM your uncompressed Image is currently using by looking in the bottom left corner. The first number is without Layers, the second with all Layers accounted for.
How much Ram do you need for Photoshop?
Ok, this was difficult enough, let’s look at this table, where all Important factors above have already been considered:
| Resolution Megapixel | 8bpc | 10bpc | 16bpc | 32bpc |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 8MP | 24 MByte | 30 MByte | 48 MByte | 96 MByte |
| 12MP | 36 MByte | 45 MByte | 72 MByte | 144 MByte |
| 16MP | 48 MByte | 60 MByte | 96 MByte | 192 MByte |
| 20MP | 60 MByte | 75 MByte | 120 MByte | 240 MByte |
Great, now you can roughly estimate or calculate how much RAM a single Image will need.
Now, to truly estimate How much RAM you will need for Photo Editing all you have to think about is:
- What Bit Depth do I edit Photos in (usually 8Bpc for JPGs, 16bpc for RAW Files)
- How many Photos do I have open at the same time
- How many Layers do my Photos usually have on average
- How much RAM does my System need additionally
That said, if you don’t want to calculate it yourself but just want some quick recommendation here it is:
On Win 10 and Photoshop, 8 – 16GByte of RAM will be more than enough for most of your tasks when editing JPG Photos in the 10 – 20MP range and the occasional RAW Image.
If you are a power user, who edits mainly in high Bit depths and Resolutions and might have lots of other RAM intensive Software running in the background, consider 16+ GByte of RAM.
Looking for some quick RAM recommendations? Here you go, this is one of the most popular Memory Kit there is: 16GB Corsair Vengeance LPX DDR4 3200MHz RAM
That’s about it, have I missed anything? Let me know in the comments.
Hi Alex,
i want to buy a surfaace book2, i7 8gb ram and geforce 1050 2gb. i will use photohop and lightroom to edit and export my raw photos (each time around 50 16mp image).
is 8gb ram enough for me for next 4 years? (i cant upgrade it)
Hey Frank,
I’d say 8GB of RAM is quite on the low end, especially if you plan on using the Surface Book for the next 4 years, and have to consider working with higher-res images down the line. There are Surface Books with 16GB of RAM. If you can swing it I’d recommend going with that amount.
Cheers,
Alex
Hi Alex
This is a question that does not fit the specific subject of your article but relates to Photoshop, but i dont know where else to put it. Feel free to answer it wherever you think it fits in.
Can you suggest setups for Photoshop, drawing on a touch screen? Maybe even fit in the different pro and cons using a pad and a screen. Since the i pad introduced screen drawing with finger tip many ppl are getting used to draw on a touch screen, and will look for a good solution for this.
Thank you for your well written articles that describe all the possible builds very clearly.
Ty and best wishes.
Hey ETS,
I am sorry to say I don’t have sufficient knowledge in this area. Maybe go by a photoshop subreddit and see if they have extensive experience in this area?
Cheers,
Alex
Hi Alex
Thank you for your answer. As far as i can tell this area is in the early stages. Mainly driven from the emerging Ipad apps and used by youngsters. All the users with extensive experience have been using drawing pad like Waco and have got familiar with using these (indirect drawing) devices. But the newcomers are spoiled, always drawing directly on the screen, and seem to have issues using the waco pads. But the Ipad apps are still not on a professional level.
And since your articles are explaining every aspect so clearly i wanted to hear your opinion on the subject regarding to use a professional program like Photo Shop or animaton software, with touch screens and the harware for optimizing it. As far as i can read on the web, the atempts to do so has some serious difficulties, that only someone with lots of experience in putting the right harware and software together, can acomplish.
Thank you for your time and Best whishes
ETS
Hey ETS,
From what I can put together you should definitely go for high core clocks, as drawing is a process that uses only a single cpu core most of the time, so think i9 9900k or the upcoming ryzen 7 3700X / 3800X / 3900X for example. Everything else is probably not too important in a drawing-oriented PC. RAM go with 16GB or more, get an M.2 SSD, get a decent GPU which doesnt have to be too strong such as a RTX 2060. In terms of drawing hardware / touchscreens I only have limited knowledge but know that the Wacom tablets are leading in this regard, but seem to come at a premium price too.
I would think concerning drawing on a pad or screen, I would want to go to a store and test the devices before buying one. Does it lag behind when drawing? How large is the distance of the screen to the pen, how great is the pen, does it smear, collect fingerprints, is the resolution high enough and so on..
Hope this helps,
Alex
Good article, however, some changes would be advisable…. In your article you are not taking into account that inactive programs/documents are swapped to disk, and not occupying physical memory. The best way to determine if you need to increase RAM is to monitor the computer’s memory swapping to disk (Rather than trying to calculate the requirement). Using “Resource Monitor” Memory -> Hard Faults/sec, shows this activity. “Resource Monitor” is available from “Task Manager”. Have a nice day 🙂
Hey jie,
Awesome Thanks! Will look into your suggestions and include them in the article.
Cheers!
Alex
I think this is a pretty good way to start … looking at when things with your normal workflow are usually slowing down!
I normally have some youtube music running, along with Lightroom and Photoshop and 8 GB is a total drag, it’s just not enough. When I upgraded to 24 GB I thought it would be too much but apparently LR and PS grab a bit more memory once it’s there and under normal conditions I get close to 20 GB actively being used — but not swapping anymore, so yay.
As a question of principle: are there any disadvantages of getting MORE memory, say 64 GB ?? apart from the cost …
Hey cba,
Some systems such as the Threadripper platform have trouble clocking the RAM at high speeds when all RAM slots are populated. So for example if you had 8x 16gb of ram they would usually only clocks at 2133mhz or 2400mhz but wont be able to clock at 2933mhz. But with 64 GB you don’t have any disadvantages.
Cheers,
Alex
Hello i’m using photoshop for drawing. Currently I draw 12k x 15k resolution. When just opening photoshop file it is using all of my 16gb of ram. I need way more. But not sure how much. Any ideas? Next project will be even bigger.
Hey Martin,
In the bottom left corner of Photoshop there should be an indicator of memory intensive the current file is. What does it say there?
Cheers,
Alex
When i edit in photoshop cs5 (yes, its old af) i edit 4k pictures with tens of layers, and it doesnt take any more than around 100MB of ram.
Same. I’m using Photoshop 6 with 5D Mark IV TIFFs and have zero problems with 8gb ram.
One has to wonder why Chrome needs over a GB of RAM?
As far as I know, general photo editor don’t use more than 8GB of RAM if you don’t deal with really complicated and heavy editing. Obviously, software like Photoshop consumes more resources than something less powerful. These figures depend on the tasks to fulfill.
Hi Alex,
The Photo Editor itself probably won’t use all that much for the average user, thats right. Though knowing how much other software uses up and limits you is good to know. Also think about editing RAW images and lots of them. That can eat into your RAM very fast!
Cheers